Exhibition reveals a day in the life of a seasonal worker

Over two years, disposable cameras were given to 30 seasonal workers, including backpackers on working holiday visas and those on labour mobility visas from the Pacific Islands and Timor-Leste.

The Griffith University artist and researcher behind the project, Dr Kaya Barry, said her interest in travel and migration was likely due from her upbringing.

She travelled extensively around Queensland in a caravan with her parents who engaged in various types of work, including farm work in the cane industry.

Her research started in Bundaberg in 2019 when she started interviewing backpackers and migrant workers about what life was like, mainly in horticulture.

She said prior to 2020, the industry was full of complaints around working conditions and exploitation, but the pandemic brought a lot of changes due to the sudden lack of seasonal workers.

She said the introduction of a minimum hourly rate for horticultural in 2022 revolutionised the industry, and although it may have been difficult for some growers, it really cleaned things up.

Despite the bad press, she observed strong connections between the workers and local businesses and noticed a large hole in the social fabric of those communities following the pandemic.

"There were a lot of negative stories and bad stereotypes around farming and treatment of migrant workers, but I saw there there was a need for a different angle to be told of how Australians and these workers came together," she said.

Dr Barry threw herself into research and she started conducting more interviews and handing out disposable cameras to the seasonal workers to see life from their perspective.

She got photos back from as far north as the Cape York Peninsula, all along the east coast and many from the Wide Bay-Burnett region.

"The photos could be on the farm, them in the pack shed, it might be them just hanging out waiting for their laundry to be finished," she said.

"There's lots of photos of people queuing for shuttle buses to and from the farms, or sitting on the ground during the break time, or out on a weekend fishing.

"The backpackers have been taking great photos of pubs, so some of them are really playful, and really joyous and lots of people posing really proud holding produce that they're picking.

"The the other side of can be quite dull and boring or showing the hard or dirty aspects of this life too.

"I think it's important to show those moments because even in a small farming village where everyone's involved in a farm in some way, unless you're directly engaging with these migrant workers, you don't really know how they see it or feel.

"You might chat to them at the pub, pass them in the post office queue, but don't really have any engagement with what it might be like for them."

Dr Barry said the landscape was about to change again for many rural communities due to the changes to the PALM scheme being phased in by July 1.

Farms will soon need to ensure 30 hours of work per week averaged out over four weeks, rather than over the time of their placement.

"The numbers are already dropping as a lot of growers are being forced not bring back the full amount of workers they might have had last season or on the last contract, because the risks are too high in such a weather dependent industry," she said.

She thought the changes could decimate small businesses and reduce the number of opportunities available.

Dr Barry had already heard some comments about the likely departure of many PALM workers on local communities, such as in sporting teams, where their absence would be felt strongly by locals.

Dr Barry hoped the collection of photographs showcased in an upcoming exhibition in Childers would ignite important discussions.

"I hope they will spark some different kinds of conversations about how these workers not only contribute as much needed labour, but are also just here, living alongside us, doing what we all do, day in, day out," she said.

The exhibition will be on display between April 20 and July 14 at the Childers Arts Space.

It will also tour regional and rural Queensland over the next year, with exhibitions locked in for Mundubbera and Gayndah.